Shepard is sent to rescue the scientist Ann Brynson, who you find at a Reaper-indoctrinated mining facility. The colony has been controlled by a Reaper named Leviathan for 10 years. Leviathan is referred to as a defector, a traitor who killed one of its own kind. One dialogue line hints to more information about the Reapers' creators, briefly alluded to by the Star Child in the game's ending. "So the Reapers did not fully exterminate their creators. That suggests they are fallible, even on large or long-term scales."

It's weird now to still play "The Shepard". They made it so very clear, that ME3 is the end of Shep's story that I don't see who still wants to go there. I agree with this dude from Forbes, that it would be best to make all future DLC with other characters. They should have Liara, Tali, Garrus… and so on as playable characters. The next Mass Effect game is gonna do that anyways.

lol I bet Bioware deliberately left that file there, knowing people will discover it soon enough and start to twist their brains to come up with these theories. Really amusing though.

So, after skimming through a couple of pages, the idea goes:

Leviathan = Rogue Reaper who was trapped in Reaper shell, and it's true identity is Thorian we encountered on Feros

Basically, now people are suggesting that Leviathan/Thorian created the star child, who rebelled against them and trapped/forced to merge them with Reaper shell i.e creating TRUE reapers. lol. Whether it be true or now, I like how just that one little file creates so much rumours/speculations.

I reckon if its true, it will not be future DLC. Sounds more like additional storyline content that Bioware couldn't handle and decided to abandon.

Originally Posted by Malkavian
It's weird now to still play "The Shepard". They made it so very clear, that ME3 is the end of Shep's story that I don't see who still wants to go there. I agree with this dude from Forbes, that it would be best to make all future DLC with other characters. They should have Liara, Tali, Garrus and so on as playable characters. The next Mass Effect game is gonna do that anyways.

I don't follow. All the DLC takes place before the ending.

Playing as one of the companions might feel a bit gimmicky, like Leliana's Song, or some Batman DLC. I'd rather see something that expands the Shepard gameplay, like a new playable class, or, say adds a new element to the game by improving the space battles, etc.

I find the closing bit from Eurogamer especially true: "One thing's for sure, though. After this and the Dragon Age 2 debacle, BioWare is officially facing its third strike with whatever comes next. For its own sake and ours, whatever that is really needs to knock it out of the park. Forgiving is not forgetting, and fans have been asked to do far too much of it recently. BioWare shouldn't give up its creative control, or its willingness to do courageous things with its stories - but it does need to take a cold, hard look at how it slipped to the point where this kind of patching was required and make sure that its next epic RPG knows how to finish what it started on the very first try."

Originally Posted by zahratustra
I find the closing bit from Eurogamer especially true: "One thing's for sure, though. After this and the Dragon Age 2 debacle, BioWare is officially facing its third strike with whatever comes next. For its own sake and ours, whatever that is really needs to knock it out of the park. Forgiving is not forgetting, and fans have been asked to do far too much of it recently. BioWare shouldn't give up its creative control, or its willingness to do courageous things with its stories - but it does need to take a cold, hard look at how it slipped to the point where this kind of patching was required and make sure that its next epic RPG knows how to finish what it started on the very first try."

I think every problem with DA2 and ME3 can be chalked up to not enough development time. To make a truly great RPG with lots of voiced dialogue, you need a few years at least.

They cranked out both of these games in around 18 months. That's simply not enough dev time for this type of game. Regardless of how many staff you have on board, you need to iterate the build until you get everything just right.

Originally Posted by zahratustra
I agree but the point is that after DA2 fiasco Bioware should have been aware that you can't fob off players with under cooked game. And yet they have done the same with ME3. Stupid or insane?

Perhaps there is unreasonable pressure from their parent company (EA) to produce these games in such a short a period of time?

I seem to recall reading recently that they pushed back the DA3 release date, or postponed it, maybe this is a good sign?

Originally Posted by zahratustra
I find the closing bit from Eurogamer especially true: "One thing's for sure, though. After this and the Dragon Age 2 debacle, BioWare is officially facing its third strike with whatever comes next. For its own sake and ours, whatever that is really needs to knock it out of the park. Forgiving is not forgetting, and fans have been asked to do far too much of it recently. BioWare shouldn't give up its creative control, or its willingness to do courageous things with its stories - but it does need to take a cold, hard look at how it slipped to the point where this kind of patching was required and make sure that its next epic RPG knows how to finish what it started on the very first try."

Is the newsreporter any representative of the Bioware products buyers?

Has ME3 done that bad (excluding the "it should have done better" gimmick?)

As long as the game sells and sells well, why bother? Bioware has achieved quite a lot with ME3(online retailer exclusive, SP game turned into a MU without notice)
A lighter version of Diablo 3 achievements in terms of game video industry progression.

Bioware's next (major)game will sell well, will ignite controversy etc Usual business so why bother?

Newsreporter only speaks for himself and a handful when writing fans have born too much.

Originally Posted by ChienAboyeur
Has ME3 done that bad (excluding the "it should have done better" gimmick?).

ME3 has sold well but how many people bought it on the strength of Bioware's pre-release promises of "meaningful player choice, multiple significantly different endings and closure for the characters and series"?

Originally Posted by zahratustra
ME3 has sold well but how many people bought it on the strength of Bioware's pre-release promises of "meaningful player choice, multiple significantly different endings and closure for the characters and series"?

In my mind, a fair number of them (I am one of them at least)

But the dynamics can be sustained. ME universe is going to milk. While the character's dynamics might be broken (it might be not if the game refers to the hero as the shepard, which could mean an assassin creed approach), the universe dynamics is here to live out.

How many of the future customers of the next ME arc are going to buy because they want to know more about the evolution of the universe? The ball keeps rebounding.

Sounds interesting.
One of the still present flaws with the ending is that its concept and theme come out of nowhere, this could provide some foreshadowing (as the first paid DLC already does a bit, actually) for at least a bit better narrative flow.
It could also be a silly mess if itīs not written carefully.

I think that the smart thing to do with the DLCs (besides obvious stuff like making them fun and interesting) would be to tie them somewhat closely to the core story, use parts of them to fix at least some of the issues with the overarching narrative and let them affect the gameīs ending in some ways (besides EMS boost, which now isnīt really needed).
This DLC could make the final encounter not to come as out of nowhere as it does now, rumored Take Back Omega could address some of the issues with Cerberus and the fact that the final choice from ME2 has barely any effect on ME3īs narrative, etc.

This would likely make them easy targets for "shouldīve been there in the first place" criticism, but at least it would preserve the game in a better shape for replays and … future
generations .

Following the BioWare DA2 debacle, BioWare defenders were out in force explaining that DA2 was actually a great game and all the uproar was a mere tempest in a teapot. When the uproar didn't disappear, the BW Defense Corps said it still didn't make any difference. But it wasn't too long later that BW announced that there would be no more DA2 DLC, and a planned DA2 expansion had been cancelled.

Similar reaction from the BW Defense Corps over SWTOR problems. There are no real problems, the BW Defense Corps said. Everything is great. Then came the layoffs. And now the talk from BW is that they're considering converting SWTOR to Free To Play.

BW has lost a lot of ME fans. Make no mistake about it. Sales of ME3 piggybacked on fan's love of ME1 and ME2. But the fan base isn't the same as it was before ME3. Moreover, even if BW's wrong headed ME3 publicity campaign didn't rise to the level of an actionable legal "misleading advertising" offense, BW has now managed to convey to the fan base that whatever BW says about upcoming releases should be taken with a grain of salt. The fans should expect a lot of exaggeration and sales puffery.

What BW's past actually teaches is that BW management and BW fans are apparently blind to damage that BW is causing to BW. And damage inflicted by BW on BW today, will have negative consequences for BW tomorrow. It's also safe to predict that when the chickens come home to roost, BW management will exclaim, "We were taken by surprise."